Mini Shogi Released
by Chris Jorgensen · 11/10/2008 (11:43 pm) · 4 comments
I've just "released" my third game off my website, Mini Shogi. It's my first attempt to take an existing game of mine (Mini Chess) and iterate it into a better quality product. Overall I think it's a solid game that continues the utilization of the adversary search code that I've written.
Development for this game was fast but not as fast as you might think. For example, the chess engine could not handle starting styles where each side had less than 10 pieces. The chess code also required manually syncing the script's pieces with the C++ engine's pieces. Both have been fixed for the shogi code. Mini Shogi also has a slightly slicker interface. Overall, I made several improvements that will allow me to more easily develop future games with this code.
During this week (11/10), it'll have a price match with Mini Chess's Game du Jour price at $3.50 with the "gamedujour" coupon. In the future, I'll probably bundle it with Mini Chess.
Soo... I'm now at that point again of figuring out what's next. Xeno Versus needs an overhaul. My "mode 7" TGB mod sits waiting to be turned into a full game. And I've got the ability to update the chess engine to handle 120 squares, which makes me wonder about doing a bigger board game -- some sort of war game, perhaps.
Anywho, that's it for me for now. Obviously my next blog will be about progress on which project I'm tackling next.
Development for this game was fast but not as fast as you might think. For example, the chess engine could not handle starting styles where each side had less than 10 pieces. The chess code also required manually syncing the script's pieces with the C++ engine's pieces. Both have been fixed for the shogi code. Mini Shogi also has a slightly slicker interface. Overall, I made several improvements that will allow me to more easily develop future games with this code.
During this week (11/10), it'll have a price match with Mini Chess's Game du Jour price at $3.50 with the "gamedujour" coupon. In the future, I'll probably bundle it with Mini Chess.
Soo... I'm now at that point again of figuring out what's next. Xeno Versus needs an overhaul. My "mode 7" TGB mod sits waiting to be turned into a full game. And I've got the ability to update the chess engine to handle 120 squares, which makes me wonder about doing a bigger board game -- some sort of war game, perhaps.
Anywho, that's it for me for now. Obviously my next blog will be about progress on which project I'm tackling next.
About the author
Owner of Cascadia Games
#2
11/11/2008 (6:10 pm)
Thanks Deborah. I'm getting into a good productivity groove with TGB. Though I think three is probably it for the year unless things rapidly come together on one of the other outstanding projects. :) 
#3
11/12/2008 (2:36 pm)
Whilst I'm not actually sure what shogi is, I would imagine that it would be very difficult to write the AI for something as complex and tactical as a game like chess.
#4
It's not so much difficult as it is easy to get wrong. :) I would have liked to have written a smarter AI, but unfortunately some of the advanced features never got working right. I had to declare it "smart enough" for the sake of finishing.
Shogi is Japanese chess. It shares a common ancestor with Western chess.
11/12/2008 (5:33 pm)
Steve: It's not so much difficult as it is easy to get wrong. :) I would have liked to have written a smarter AI, but unfortunately some of the advanced features never got working right. I had to declare it "smart enough" for the sake of finishing.
Shogi is Japanese chess. It shares a common ancestor with Western chess.
Employee Deborah M. Fike